nd<\/sup> mount there, really wish it was on proper water bottle bosses though.<\/p>\nAfter getting the tires sorted out, the 29 inch wheels are awesome and the bike just eats up flowing single track trails. \u00a0\u00a0I\u2019m getting more comfortable and faster on each ride.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I moved the carbon handlebars from my old bike, 23 inch flat bars, with short barends.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Can\u2019t see any reason to change them, they are MUCH narrower than the current trend to wide, riser bars like the Hei Hei came with, but I like them, maybe from a lifetime of road riding that width just feels right.<\/p>\n
When setting up the levers\/ grips\/barends on the bars, before cutting the rubber grips or making any permanent modifications , \u00a0I decided to wrap the grip section with some leftover padded tape from my road bike, just until I was sure how I wanted everything to be laid out.\u00a0 I\u2019ve not given it a thought while riding, and I\u2019ll likely keep this setup for now.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0It weights nothing, is easy to replace and I\u2019ve been comfortable on it.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
TIRES:<\/p>\n
The bike came with Maxxis Ignitor tires front and rear, after my first ride I ordered a replacement front, going with a Maxxis Advent.\u00a0\u00a0 The Ignitor in front was washing out too easily for me, but I did have a little too much pressure in them.\u00a0 The Advent feels more planted, though I\u2019ve found I have to lean it over pretty good to get those side knobs to hook up in sand\/leave\/pine needles, but do that and it rails around nicely, with some slide in the rear with the Ignitor not hooking up quiet as well.\u00a0 ( At least that is my experience with the the surfaces I\u2019m riding on.)\u00a0\u00a0 I\u2019m comfortable on them now and will keep this setup.<\/p>\n
FORK\/SHOCK:<\/p>\n
It took a few hours to get the Front Fork and Rear Shock dialed in, both seemed stiff initially, but now have loosened up and are working great.\u00a0 \u00a0I\u2019m very happy with the Reba RLT, but with so many adjustments its taking time to get it sorted like I want.\u00a0 The rear shock, which I seriously considered upgrading right off the bat, is actually working fine. \u00a0\u00a0If it breaks, I\u2019ll put a better shock on, but for the riding I\u2019m doing it is doing its job just fine.\u00a0 It did take 4 or 5 hours of riding and before it seemed to really start working for me.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
GEARING\/BRAKES:<\/p>\n
The 2012 Kona Hei Hei comes with an Sram X5 3×10(22\/33\/44) crank, which I prefer over the \u00a02×10 crank that the 2013\u2019s come with.\u00a0\u00a0 I am always in the middle ring when off-road and usually close to the middle of the 11×32 cassette, and never need to move the front derailleur. \u00a0\u00a0Honestly, I ride the bike as if it was a 1×10, and would consider converting \u00a0to 1×10 if there was a reliable way to do so without having to add a chain retention device. \u00a0The large chainring will be used a good bit on the road.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve never had disk brakes on a bicycle, and in Florida I can\u2019t say I need them.\u00a0\u00a0 But these certainly work well enough, and after riding them, I do like them better than rim brakes.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
At this point, no additional changes needed or planned for the Kona, just spending more time riding it and preparing for some race events. \u00a0\u00a0Next on the agenda is the Hammerhead 100 mile in Ocala.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a great bike for the cross country type riding I\u2019m doing and I couldn\u2019t be happier with it.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/03\/Kona_Santos1.jpg\" "\\"Kona_Santos1\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\nTHE END<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
After over 150 miles and about 14 hours of riding, all single track trails, the 2012 Kona Hei Hei gets a thumbs up!\u00a0\u00a0 LOVING this bike.\u00a0\u00a0 It\u2019s fast, comfortable and handles great.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0A beautiful bike, white with blue and black trim.\u00a0 This is my third Kona, I think they are a cool brand, and I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[4],"tags":[13,10,12,11],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=439"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":448,"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439\/revisions\/448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/03\/Kona_Epic2.jpg\" "\\"Kona_Epic2\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irun100s.com\/daveharper\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/03\/Kona_Epic3.jpg\" "\\"Kona_Epic3\\"")
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